A gently-bred heiress? (unless it's Portia, in which case NSM with the gentle)
An heiress of unexceptional birth?
A well-born heiress?
An excellently connected heiress?
Kaylee: So how many fell madly in love with you and wanted to take you away from all this? Inara: Just the one. I think I'm slipping.
'Serenity'
The Great Write Way
A place for Buffistas to discuss, beta and otherwise deal and dish on their non-fan fiction projects.
deborah grabien - Oct 11, 2004 3:38:58 pm PDT #7245 of 10001
It really doesn't matter. It's just an opinion. Don't worry about it. Not worth the hassle.
Connie Neil - Oct 11, 2004 3:40:33 pm PDT #7246 of 10001
brillig
Doesn't "heiress" have the connotation of high-born anyway, socially speaking? Unless you're wanting to differentiate between those heiresses of unfortunate fathers who had the gaucherie to be clever in business and such.
Susan W. - Oct 11, 2004 3:41:28 pm PDT #7247 of 10001
Good Trouble and Righteous Fights
It's Anna, and I think "gently bred" would work. I'm editing that one-page setup for the First Kiss contest and am trying to pare a few lines from the existing version so I can talk a little more about Jack.
Susan W. - Oct 11, 2004 3:44:30 pm PDT #7248 of 10001
Good Trouble and Righteous Fights
Unless you're wanting to differentiate between those heiresses of unfortunate fathers who had the gaucherie to be clever in business and such.
The heiress in question is both--her father was a self-made man who got himself made baronet for "(financial) services to the Crown," but her mother was the daughter of an impecunious earl. I'm just trying to use both a wealth word and a pedigree word, because my goal is to tell just how high up the social spectrum she is.
Pix - Oct 11, 2004 3:58:55 pm PDT #7249 of 10001
The status is NOT quo.
t English geek
The article is determined by the sound of the subsequent word rather than the first letter. If it is a consonent sound, it's "a". A vowel sound gets "an". "Heiress" starts with a consonent, but it is actually a vowel sound, so it is correct to us "an heiress", but "highborn" starts with a consonent sound, so it's "a highborn". So..."a highborn heiress" would be correct.
t /English geek
Susan W. - Oct 11, 2004 4:04:14 pm PDT #7250 of 10001
Good Trouble and Righteous Fights
I know that's the rule, but either way looked off in this case--maybe it was the proximity of a word with a silent H throwing me off. I kept wanting to make them more parallel by either saying "highborn hair-ess" or "'ighborn heiress."
ETA--AmyLiz, insent to your gmail account.
Pix - Oct 11, 2004 4:05:02 pm PDT #7251 of 10001
The status is NOT quo.
Gotcha. Sorry!
deborah grabien - Oct 11, 2004 4:06:08 pm PDT #7252 of 10001
It really doesn't matter. It's just an opinion. Don't worry about it. Not worth the hassle.
(lightbulb blnks)
Was Susan askng about the grammar? I didn't even notice - I thought it was a search for good terminology in which to sum up Anna briefly.
DUH, deb.
Nutty - Oct 11, 2004 4:09:51 pm PDT #7253 of 10001
"Mister Spock is on his fanny, sir. Reports heavy damage."
I would probably guess "an heiress of high birth", and avoid the sound problem you're describing, Susan. Like Deb, it took me a minute to see the problem, but once it was in my head it bounced around like a bat in a laundry basket.
Without further ado:
WANTED: One tightly-wound Judeo-Christian (or well-informed similar), any age, any sex, for passionate evenings of yellow theological struggle. Must enjoy enormous, angular, hard-muscled nudes of lower-than-average temperature. Ability to see unimportant. Please inquire @ Tate Museum, first and third Fridays, main rotunda.
(Jacob Epstein's Jacob And the Angel)
dcp - Oct 11, 2004 4:18:24 pm PDT #7254 of 10001
The more I learn, the more I realize how little I know.